The last few weeks have gone by like a whirl-wind as I’m sure it has for many of you. I’m just beiginning to catch my breath and decide which of all our family Christmas traditions are really worth it. Guess I’m a bit sentimental because so far nothing pops up as a possible cut for next year. Passing on family traditions is very important to me.

On Christmas Eve, my oldest grandchild teased me about becoming a Great Grandmother. I smiled and hugged him, “But I’ve always been a great grandmother.” He couldn’t argue with that.

My writing has been mostly Christmas cards and last minute shopping lists. But now I’m ready to get back to my real world! I’ve read two excellent books this month, Engaging Father Christmas by Robin Jones Gunn and Whistling in the Dark by Lesley Kagen. Usually I read more books in a month, but we had more guests and parties than usual, and, of course, more parties to attend.

We attended a John Tesh Christmas Concert at the local university concert hall. It was spectacular. The best concert I’ve ever seen anywhere! He is multi talented, travels with a twelve piece orchestra, and engaged the audience, he even gave two I-Pads to audience members during his show. I’ve never seen an entertainer do that before, most of them just take-take-take and mock our small town in the process. Mr. Tesh not only remembered where he was, he even darkened the stage and turned the auditorium lights on, making the audience the stars. All onstage lit their new Zippo lighters and held them high, moving them in time with piped in music. Awesome!

We watched It’s a Wonderful Life, directed by Frank Capra, probably for at least the 25th time and amazingly each year I notice some small nuance that I’d missed in previous viewings. It is truly a classic and we love it! On December 26th Christmas Vacation brought laughter to our home again with it’sslap-stick silliness. Interestingly, Frank Capra III was the director, movie genius defintely runs in that family. We also watched A Christmas Story on TV, another one that never fails to make us laugh. Of course, when the grandchildren stayed over we watched Elf, always fun! Geez, they’ve watched it so often, they can recite the lines throughout the entire movie.

We saw The Hobbit at the theater and it was not our cup of tea. At all. We went on recommendation of friends who obviously have a very different taste in entertainment. This afternoon we saw Jack Reacher at our local theater and loved it. Shot in Pittsburgh, an action movie that proved once againTom Cruise is an exceptional actor. Having Robert Duvall in a support role certainly didn’t hurt a bit.

I wish each of you the very best in 2013. Till next time, remember life is too short for bad books…and really for doing anything you don’t have to do IF it doesn’t bring you joy!

It’s been a month since I last wrote on my blog. You know what they say, time flies when you’re having fun, it also flies when a person is totally swamped! Since last entry I completed my twenty-five page page final for my Masters Course. I also wrote a chapter for a new anthology that will be published in 2013, my chapter is currently titled Tick Tock. My contirbution was accepted which called for a celebration, ice cream, of course!

We also hosted Thanksgiving dinner for our tribe, it was fun and always good to get the family together. We prepared for twenty-six and ended up with only twenty-two. Conflicting work schedules and obligations as well as distance kept some away. Each Thanksgiving we have everyone anonymously write a short statement of something they are thankful for. The folded papers go into a small basket and after dinner, while we all sit around the table begging for a break before desert is served, the basket is passed around. Everyone has to read a thankful paper and then guess who wrote it! This year I was blindsided by the following: “I am thankful for my love and our new addition.” I looked around the table trying to guess who was building on to their home…no one had mentioned anything about remodeling to me. Then someone said, “Allie, Aaron… you’re going to have a baby!” Our newlyweds beamed, baby is due next July. Oh my, a great grandchild!!

Good news, the highly esteemed Poets and Writers magazine listed the anthology, Women Writing on Family, published in January 2012, as one of the top ten books on writing published this year! I contributed a chapter on marketing.

Story Circle Journal printed my article, A Writer’s Journey, in it’s December issue. I’ve read several short books during my hour of designated realxation time at night. Entertaining and fun but not terribly memorable.

We’ve seen several movies we loved: Argo, Lincoln and Flight at the theater and The Shunning from Netflicks at home. All excellent!

We wasted our time going to see Brad Pitt in Killing Them Softly. As far as I’m concerned it had no redeeming value. None!